As a fitness professional, I’m always amazed (and puzzled) with the conflict people seem to have with losing weight, yet they refuse to stop eating junk food. An interesting thing I have noticed over my many years helping people to lose weight is that almost every single person that has told me that they are “attempting” to lose weight, almost always has their house filled with all sorts of junk food instead of whole unprocessed natural food.

Avoid Junk Food

It is not uncommon for people to tell me that they are trying really hard to lose weight, but I will still notice boxes of apple jacks and fruity pebbles on their counters, cakes, candies, and chips in their cupboard, and sodas or syrupy juices in their refrigerator.

So the question that always stumps me is that if all of these people honestly wanted to lose weight so bad, why in the world do most people still have their houses filled with junk foods instead of healthy food?

Interestingly, the answer usually is that they do not want to give up their favorite foods because they think that eating this junk food allows them to “live a little”… if you ask me, it sounds more like dying a little with each bite!

My take on it is that eating junk foods has nothing at all to do with enjoying your life… In reality, when you give up junk foods you actually enjoy life more because you feel better and are more energetic every day. In addition, getting into better shape by not eating junk food can obviously help improve the way your body looks (and therefore increases your confidence), thereby making you enjoy life even more.

One thing that many people fail to realize is that eating healthy does not have to mean eating bland and boring food. Instead, when you learn to enjoy natural unprocessed food and start exploring all of the varieties of natural food that this planet has to offer us, you learn that you can enjoy the natural flavors of real foods more than overly processed aggressive tastes that are so common with excessively sweet and salty junk food.

An example of this is that the other day I wanted an unsweetened iced tea while out on the road, but all that the store had available was these bottles of heavily sweetened iced tea. Well, I have not bought a fully sweetened iced tea in probably at least a few years now… I have actually gotten used to drinking unsweetened iced tea and have learned to appreciate the natural taste of tea without needing sugar or other sweeteners.

Whe I drank this bottled sweet tea, I almost gagged because it was so syrupy sweet, it was absolutely nasty.

A similar example… I used to need a lot of sugar in coffee, but after a slowly reducing the amount of sugar I would use in coffe, I can now actually drink black coffee and enjoy the natural flavor of it without needing sweeteners (although I rarely drink coffee).

These are just a couple examples of how once you start appreciating the natural flavors of real food, you find that you no longer need the super-aggressive salty, sugary, or artificial flavors that have been ingrained in us by the food companies and all of the junk food they push on us.

My belief is that everyone should actually enjoy what they eat, and can do it without eating overly processed junk food… Actually, people are often surprised to hear that a lot of the foods that they think are junk food, I have healthy alternatives that they never thought of.

A few examples:

Junk food: a chocolate candy bar, a chocolate donut, or a piece of chocolate cake

Healthier alternative: a couple pieces of extra-dark chocolate (greater than 70-75% cocoa content only)… this is higher in fiber and much less sugar than milk chocolate or even dark chocolates that are less than 70% cocoa content

Junk food: Deep fried and breaded chicken fingers and fries on the side (loads of nasty trans fats)

Healthier alternative: grilled chicken breast strips with peanut dipping sauce and vegetables on the side

Junk food: a cheap fast-food burger on a processed refined white bun

Healthier alternative: A grass-fed burger (higher in CLA and omega-3 fats) with raw grass-fed cheese on a sprouted grain roll

How about that for eating healthier yet still very tasty foods!

I hope that what you get out of this article is that there is more to life than eating junk food, and eating junk does not necessarily mean that you’re “living a little” as so many people say. Instead, I feel the opposite is true.

Eat healthier and discover the natural flavors of real foods (not processed) and you’ll soon discover that you no longer need junk food. Enjoy!

I receive a lot of questions from my readers where they have been doing much better at choosing healthy breakfasts, lunches, and dinners, but they are still struggling to find good ideas for healthy and quick “mid-meals”… especially a quick small meal or snack that can be brought to the office or on road trips (so you can avoid the fast food junk!).

Mid-Meal Ideas

Some people may call these “healthy snacks”, but I prefer to consider them meals because they should be similar in size to your breakfasts, lunches, and dinners, if you want to spread your calorie intake out over the full day to “graze” so to speak.

After all, I’m sure it’s no secret by now that eating 5-6 small meals per day is a much better strategy for getting lean compared to the traditional “3 squares” a day (which for most people, turns into only 2 big meals/day as many skip breakfast).

The problem that I see most people having is being prepared enough to bring healthy mid-meals with them to work for the day. If you don’t plan ahead,  and bring something healthy and balanced with you when you’re out and about for the day, or at work, you’re going to end up choosing the junk food at the vending machine or corner store.

So here are some of my favorite mid-meals that I’ve used for years with great success and that lots of my clients love too. I want to keep things simple here, so I’m just gonna give a couple of my easiest, quickest, and healthiest…

Quick, healthy mid-meal ideas to keep you lean:

• Apple or banana with almond butter
  
• Cottage cheese mixed with yogurt, berries, and walnuts or pecans
  
• A couple hard boiled eggs with carrot and celery sticks and hummus (roasted red pepper hummus is my favorite)
  
• Celery sticks with organic peanut butter (a classic quick snack)
  
• Avocado slices wrapped in deli turkey breast (one of my favorite quick snacks)
  
• A piece of sprouted grain toast (or whole grain, but sprouted grain preferred) with nut butter and berries
  
• Fresh sliced pineapple with a handful of macadamia nuts
  
• a bowl of blueberries mixed with raw almonds
  
• Cottage cheese with cinnamon, apple slices, and walnuts (mmm, mmm good)

That should give you some ideas to start working with. Remember that my Truth about Six Pack Abs ebook contains 84 additional lean-body meal ideas to keep your eating plan interesting and delicious!

In case you missed it the other day, be sure to check out some amazingly inspirational stories of people just like you, that are in their 40s, 50s, 60s, and even 70s, and have made incredible body transformations:

http://BestFitnessOver40.com

Feel free to email the link to this page to any of your friends, family, or coworkers that you think might enjoy these healthy delicious mid-meal ideas.

I’ll be back next week with some more Lean-Body Secrets. Have a great one!

Mike Geary
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Certified Personal Trainer
Founder – TruthAboutAbs.com & Busy Man Fitness .com

You see them all over the place these days… nutrition bars that claim to be healthy and good for weight loss or muscle building, but when you read the label, you see an endless list of chemicals, sugars, processed trans fats, and other harmful overly processed ingredients.

Junk Food

There are so many types of “health bars” and “protein bars” on the market today, how do you know if you are actually getting something healthy or just junk food in disguise?

Again, just as I’ve talked about grocery store food choices, you really need to know how to read labels if you’re going to stand a chance at finding a truly healthy food bar.

To be quite honest, most of the bars out there are pure junk… candy bars disguised through labeling as a health food bar.

Just a couple weeks ago, I was going on a bike ride with a friend and needed a quick bar to make sure I had enough energy for the bike ride.

Well, I didn’t have any bars on me, so my friend gave me an extra slim fast bar he had.

Keep in mind that these slim fast bars are marketed as health foods for losing weight.

These things are just a flat out joke…there’s nothing even remotely nutritional about them. In my opinion, these slim fast bars are WORSE for you than candy bars!

The first ingredient in this bar that my friend gave me was corn syrup! Then the second ingredient was sugar (hooray more sugar!), followed by hydrogenated oils (source of deadly trans fats). After that, the list went on with nothing but junk such as artificial flavors, colors, evil artificial sweeteners, more hydrogenated refined oils, and rounded out with some highly processed soy protein isolate (which despite popular belief, processed soy is NOT healthy for you… I’ll talk in detail about that in a future article) just to give your body some more junk.

So not only are these “weight loss” bars a disaster nutritionally for you, but the bar tasted absolutely horrible! It tasted like chemicals and was way too overly sweetened (not a surprise with all of the sugar, corn syrup, sugar alcohols, AND artificial sweeteners). This is a prime example of “over-engineering” of food.

So how do you determine a healthy protein bar or energy bar?

I look for simplicity in a good bar. Many of the healthiest and tastiest bars I’ve found have only a couple basic ingredients such as nuts, seeds, and fruit. I also look for organic ingredients and raw ingredients if possible.

A couple of my favorite truly healthy bars:

1. Organic Food Bars – This is actually the brand name.

Depending on which flavor, these are usually a base of organic almond butter (or cashew butter) with a certain type of fruit, organic seeds, organic biosprouts (quinoa, etc), and some organic rice protein. Some flavors include an organic dark chocolate as well. They also have a line of bars that use exclusively raw ingredients.

Not only are these bars extremely nutritious, but I think they are delicious as well and have a lot of flavors to choose from such as chocolate chip, blueberry, cranberry, high protein, and more.

You won’t find these bars at your local grocery store, but I have found them at several health food stores.

2. Larabars – These are even simpler in ingredients than organic food bars. Usually larabars are just 2 or 3 ingredients, and mostly raw… a blend of crushed nuts along with a type of fruit is the usual combination, but they have a lot of different flavors so it can vary.

These are also delicious and you will NEVER see a list of chemicals a mile long in their ingredient list… usually just nuts and fruit, and that’s it! Simple IS better. This is a very high quality bar. Again, you probably won’t find these at your local grocery store, but I’ve found these at various health food markets.

When you actually find truly healthy bars like these examples above, they make great quick snacks while you are traveling or while you are at work.

I carry some on me almost at all times, just to make sure I have healthy options to eat whenever I need a quick snack, so that I am not tempted by fast food joints or junk food vending machines. Good luck and be sure to read those labels to make sure you’re getting a health food bar and not a candy bar in disguise. See below for 5 unique tips to help you lose your stubborn belly fat.

Go to the following site to get a free report about belly fat and why even the best abdominal exercise will never help you lose stomach fat.

Mike Geary is also the author of the innovative fitness program for skiers that will show you how to get legs of steel for the skiing season with this effective Skiing Fitness Workout